Southern First Bancshares, Inc. operates as the bank holding company for Southern First Bank that provides commercial, consumer, and mortgage loans to the general public in South Carolina, North Carolina, and Georgia. The company accepts various deposit products that include checking accounts, commercial checking accounts, and savings accounts, as well as other time deposits, including daily money market accounts and …
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Competitive advantage assessment
Key risks
Capital Adequacy ConcernsCapital adequacy is concerning (score 0.27).
Credit Quality ConcernsCredit quality is concerning (asset quality score 0.34).
The dashed ring is the peer median. Defense scores are percentile ranks
against peers, so 50 is roughly the typical company in this group.
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Southern First Bancshares, Inc. ranks #278 of 393
scored companies in Banks - Regional by moat score — the top 71%.
The widest moat in the group is 1st Source Corporation (SRCE)
at 86/100.
Moat scores for companies ranked near SFST in Banks - Regional
A deposit franchise is the cheapest and most valuable thing a bank can own.
Lending Advantage
Score 37
· 18% of the moat score
Lending advantage is the ability to originate loans at attractive spreads without buying that volume with looser credit standards.
Capital Strength
Score 31
· 20% of the moat score
Capital is the buffer between loan losses and insolvency, and it is what regulators judge a bank on first.
Cost Discipline
Score 39
· 16% of the moat score
Banking carries high fixed costs in branches, compliance and technology, so what it costs to run the bank relative to what the bank earns is a genuine competitive variable.
Revenue Diversification
Score 60
· 14% of the moat score
A bank earning everything from net interest income is a leveraged bet on the rate cycle.
Risk Management
Score 29
· 10% of the moat score
Risk management is the defense that only reveals itself late.
What is Southern First Bancshares, Inc.'s moat score?
Southern First Bancshares, Inc. (SFST) scores 37 out of 100 on the StatsAlpha Moat Map, which rates its competitive advantage as developing. It ranks #278 of 393 scored companies in Banks - Regional, the top 71%. The score is a weighted composite of 6 competitive defenses, each measured against industry peers of 399 companies in Banks - Regional. Its strongest defense is Revenue Diversification (60/100) and its weakest is Risk Management (29/100).
How does Southern First Bancshares, Inc. compare with other Banks - Regional companies?
Southern First Bancshares, Inc. ranks #278 of 393 scored companies in Banks - Regional by moat score. The widest moat in Banks - Regional is 1st Source Corporation (SRCE) at 86/100. The companies ranked closest are Provident Financial Holdings, I (PROV) at 38 just above it and ChoiceOne Financial Services, I (COFS) at 37 just below it.
How is the moat score calculated?
Each company is scored with an industry-specific template — Bank Specialized in this case, chosen because the defenses that matter to a bank are not the ones that matter to a software company. Every defense combines several financial signals, and each signal is measured as a percentile against a peer group of 399 companies in Banks - Regional. The defenses are then weighted to produce the overall score out of 100.
Why is Southern First Bancshares, Inc. scored with the Bank Specialized template?
A bank does not sell a product at a margin. It funds itself, lends at a spread, and books profits that remain an estimate until the loans are actually repaid. That makes the usual margin-and-return questions misleading, so the Bank template scores what really determines a bank's durability: where its funding comes from, what it lends against, how much capital stands behind it, and whether it has been pricing risk honestly.
Which competitive defenses are measured for Southern First Bancshares, Inc.?
The Bank Specialized template measures 6 defenses, and SFST scores: Deposit Franchise (32), Lending Advantage (37), Capital Strength (31), Cost Discipline (39), Revenue Diversification (60), Risk Management (29). Each is scored independently as a percentile against peers, so a company can be strong on one and weak on another — the overall score reflects how those defenses are weighted for this industry.
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